


Egg Day

by woke_up_on_derse



Category: Homestuck
Genre: A truly absurd amount of fluff, Established Relationship, M/M, almost hurt/comfort but mostly just comfort, brief discussion of child abuse, dave learns how to bake and its great, frustrating discussions of science and history, top banter lads
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-16
Updated: 2016-11-16
Packaged: 2018-08-31 08:05:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8570842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/woke_up_on_derse/pseuds/woke_up_on_derse
Summary: "You've never heard of frittata /or/ quiche before?"
"Is it an alien thing?"
"I...? Maybe? Either way, you know omelettes, right?"
"Yeah, they're like, rich people food."
"... Honey, they have two ingredients."
"Is one of them caviar?"
"One is eggs and the other is milk."
"....."
"Do we need to celebrate Egg Day?"
"I think we need to celebrate Egg Day."________*********________
AKA
Dave is horrifically inept at making food and joins forces with his boyfriend Karkat to forge a new holiday centered around learning how to not starve





	

You'll admit it, you've gotten a little out of shape ever since you hopped on this mistake conga line of a meteor. This fuck truck. The blunder bus. The pain train. The trauma.... Um.. Well. You'll finish that one later. It's hard to think of rhymes when you have exactly zero atoms (particles? Fuck if you know) of air in your brain right now. You're on your 35th rep and crashing hard. It's impossible to tell how much weight you're lifting right now because you have no clue whatsoever on how to make the alchemiter spit out weights with the little labels on it. That'd be like having Rose sew you a shirt and expecting it to come with those "Made in Tibet/China/good ol' U.S.America" sticky-outy fabric tabs. Regardless, you can tell it's a whole fuckin' lot. 

Currently, you're on the floor with your head pushed up against one of the dining chairs. You like exercising in the kitchen for a number of reasons: 1) the tile is cool and if you get too sweaty you can just pull up on the back of your shirt and have direct hot-to-cool contact 2) Rose has her life together and eats at scheduled times in the day so you know she won't bother you when you're in here at 11 A.M. and 3) if someone does walk in, they might be nice enough to make you Cup O' Noodles. Terezi calls you lazy every time, but you aren't a very patient dude, regardless of your responsibilities as Knight of Time. You lower your bar into a sorta-resting position and hear footsteps over your heartbeat. Speak of the devil and she shall appear. You're getting your noodles this morning, yessiree. 

"Eight hundred and six. Eight hundred and seven..." You pant out, starting back up into your reps. 

"Bullshit. You couldn't churn out one hundred if you were benching a pool noodle with nothing on the ends."

That makes you pause. Terezi is the number one supporter of you bullshitting your strength quota. You set down the bar with an awful clang and stand up, maybe a bit too fast. 

You hold onto the back of a chair while you pant out, "Ya know, I just thought that for maybe five seconds I could chill on this hell rock and not do triathlon training. Especially considering how we have almost two whole years left."

"Five seconds? You've skipped arm day at least-" Karkat squints at your biceps as though he could see a number etched into it if he looked closely, "-fifty times." 

You scoff like a soccer mom. "And you've skipped leg day at least-" you give your boyfriend's perfectly sculpted calves the same treatment, "five /hundred/ times."

He laughs instead. Smirking playfully, he picks up your arm. "Arm day? More like-" he jiggles your arm up and down like its a rag doll, "yarn day."

"Oh yeah? Leg day? More like egg day." You definitely stood up too fast. 

"......?"

"... Okay, not my best."

"And what would 'Egg Day' entail for celebrators?"

"Yanno, fuckin, whatever it is you wanna do with eggs. It's a celebration of versatility. You can egg someone's house, you can... egg someone's garage, you can put an egg on someone's chair. Endless possibilities."

"Endless?"

"Yeah, babe. Just-" you wave your hand around, nonchalant, "-endless. What do you wanna do to celebrate this fine Egg Day?"

"Hmmm. Cake?"

"Cake isn't eggs."

"Cake is made from eggs."

You must say you're a little skeptical. "Always?"

"Yes, Dave. Cake is always eggs."

"Okay, but that's cheating. It has to be mostly egg."

"Huh. Well, what about omelettes, frittata, quiche?" 

"..... Gesundheit."

"What? What's wrong with quiche?"

"Well, the fact that you definitely made it up is wrong. Also fuckin, like, fitatata."

"You've never heard of frittata /or/ quiche before?"

"Is it an alien thing?"

"I...? Maybe? Either way, you know omelettes, right?"

"Yeah, they're like, rich people food."

"... Honey, they have two ingredients."

"Is one of them caviar?"

"One is eggs and the other is milk."

"....."

"Do we need to celebrate Egg Day?"

"I think we need to celebrate Egg Day."

________************________

"Okay, first things first, get some eggs." Karkat says as he ties his apron in the back. You scramble (pun intended) to the fridge and pull out a carton. 

"These?" You hold up the carton. It has a big "A" on it. You assume that means it passed the egg test with flying colors. 

"Yes, Dave. Those are eggs."

"I knew that. I was just- nevermind."

"Now pull out milk. You know what that looks like?"

"Yes. Yes, I know what milk is. Do you know what milkdis is?"

He seems genuinely surprised by your milk knowledge, like you went to milk college. "What's milkdis?"

"Milk dis dick." You joke and toss a quart of real milk his way. 

He catches it with a sour look on his face and turns to open the cabinet. He pulls out a small bowl. "Okay, don't ever do that again." He slides the bowl your way. "Crack open two or three eggs, pour in some milk, and whip it until you can't see any white."

You freeze. "How many eggs is better?"

Karkat shrugs, "Whichever you think is better."

"Okaaay. And how much milk is 'some' milk?"

"Have you ever owned a brain? Some milk is some milk! Just pour what looks right."

"Geez, fine. I'll just..." You pour less milk in than egg but feel kinda uneasy about it. You're definitely gonna fuck it up. You stir vigorously while Karkat greases the pan. So vigorously, in fact, you don't notice what's going on behind you until Karkat's hand is on your shoulder. You jump at least six inches off the ground. 

"Hey, man, you okay? I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you, I just-" he starts. 

Your mouth runs like a motor when you choke out "Yeah, it's okay, I'm fine, I just have bad memories in kitchens and felt like I was gonna die but it's okay because it's just you so I'm okay."

"....Dave? Do you need to talk about it?"

"Yeah, I mean, no. It's fine." You blurt out. He doesn't look even slightly convinced. 

"Do you have some sort of eating...problem?" You always felt special when he used that voice. A soft and gentle voice he only used with you. 

"No, no. Not an eating disorder. It's just that, you know, not everybody always feels super safe in kitchens."

He's doing that holding onto your forearm thing again, running circles into you with the pad of his thumb, careful to avoid piercing you with his wicked nails. You always wondered how he put up with them. "Is this about Bro?" 

"It's not that I couldn't, like, walk into the kitchen without being attacked. It happened a lot but not every time, yanno? There was never any food anyway so it's not like it mattered much. I'd just order pizza or something."

Karkat blinks. "There straight up wasn't any food?"

"Well, no."

The rubbing on your forearm graduates into a full-on back rubbing plus hug combo. "What about PB&J?"

"I mean, I got those uncrustable things for school lunches. They were always cooler than bein' cool, though, so I had to microwave 'em."

"What's cooler than being cool?"

"Ice cold." You explain. Karkat nods sagely while you keep down the need to say 'Alright, alright, alright, alright'. 

"You know what that means?" He says, holding you at arms length. "It means Egg Day has turned into Teach Dave Basic Cooking Skills Day. Starting with sandwiches."

"Could we finish Teach Dave Eggs Day first?"

________*************________

The omelette is way fluffier than you thought it would be, if a little burnt. You didn't know you had to put stuff in it while it was still cooking so it ended up being on the stove too long while you fumbled with the cheese. Next time, you think you'll put tomatoes in it. 

"I'm assuming nobody ever cared to teach you how to make bread?" He says, pulling out a big bag of what looks like flour. 

"Shit, man. You really think anybody wastes their time that way? We Striders are busy people. Just buy it from Subway if you want it. It can't be more than, like, 10 bucks, right?"

"I don't think you're going to elaborate on what a 'buck' is, so I'm moving on. Anyway, bread is expensive and making it only takes a few hours at most so-"

"Bro! You've gotta be kidding me. What part of 'Striders are busy' do you not get?"

"Busy doing what? Jacking off to Cooking Mama?"

"Damn. You're right." You deadpan then check a watch you don't have, "And it looks like I'm late to my twice daily sessions. See you around."

"Okay! Fine! We'll use the pre-made bread." He then proceeds to pull out the fanciest bread you've ever seen in person. It's an oval loaf with darker, but probably not actually burnt, spots and flour on top (isn't that supposed to go in the middle?) and what looks like seeds poking out like the strawberry bits in a "healthy" popsicle but you can't be sure. You have no clue what it tastes like but you assume it's what shows up on Bobby Flay's plate every time he stoops low enough to make commoner food. 

"Did you make that?" You ask, astonished. 

"Well, yeah. Like I said, bread is expensive and I did most everything from my hive so it was the most logical choice for a freakblood."

"So you made that when you were 12?" The bread no longer looks appetizing. 

"You.... You have not a fucking clue how bread works do you? Have you ever eaten even just week old bread that wasn't stored right? Disgusting what humans will put up with." He looks honestly stunned. "You backwards fucking mammals would eat your own asses if you could bend that far, wouldn't you?"

"Well, I mean, it's a preference. You got me there, but we don't eat our young as a topping so...."

Karkat raises his eyebrows so high they fly off his face and cut through the vents. "Really? Tell me truthfully that you would never consider eating a barely-person."

That's an incredibly uncomfortable question so you change the subject. "So when are we gonna make the meat?"

Karkat rubs his temples in an unnecessarily dramatic fashion. "You could fill a Reader's Digest in what you know about practical living. You don't slap down some flour and suddenly have moobeast flesh." He then looks you in the eyes. "Have you ever taken a biology or chemistry class?"

"Shit. We pullin out the beakers now? I went to a public school and they didn't teach me dick about shit."

"Really? Never? Those were my strong suits."

"You serious? You always struck me as an English major."

"I made your entire universe."

".... Damn. I forgot about that. Well, my favorite classes were history. I kinda wanted to dig around in the dirt and uncover lost civilizations and dinosaurs and shit when I grew up. Well, you know, before Earth was destroyed."

"Dinosaurs?"

"Fuck. Y'all don't know about dinos? Didn't you see 'em when you were watching the universe pan out like the naughty voyeurs you are? They were the shit. Huge reptiles that existed long before humans and got wiped out by an asteroid. Maybe two."

"Okay, so you can tell me that giant lizards controlled your planet but frittatas are fake?" 

"Dinos are totally real! I'll show you sometime. I'm sure I've got something lying around in a jar in my room. Maybe a pop-up book for babies? Anyway, why'd you ask about chemistry?"

"Well, I was trying to explain the difference between bread and meat in atom terms but..." 

"Dude, I totally know atoms. Mad small, smaller than cells. You split 'em and you die. I can handle atom knowledge, lay it on me." 

"So, imagine that bread is steel."

"Aaand you lost me."

"Shush. It's simple. So bread is steel because it has multiple parts that are put together but can no longer be separated. Bread has different ingredients, steel has different atoms. It can be hard to make if you don't have the right equipment, so most people buy it in its finished form. Now meat-" he pulls out a tupperware box of turkey, "is an atom. One type of thing, it can't be broken down."

You pick up your boyfriend's hand and rake his middle finger down a slice of turkey, messily ripping it in kinda-half. Cue raised eyebrows. 

"You know what I mean! Sure, you can break turkey, thanks for the demo, Professor Jackass. What I meant was you can't split turkey into flour and salt or some primitive alchemy shit, it's just meat! This whole conversation boils down to me mocking you for being an idiot for asking to make meat, okay? That's it. That's all I had to say!"

"Wow. You suck ass at explaining biology."

"That wasn't real science." He crosses his arms defensively. 

"Huh? Atoms and shit are definitely science."

"Bread isn't steel."

"Well, duh. But atoms and cells are real. Teach me real facts about science." On one hand, you like seeing him flustered (he beats his hella-long eyelashes and pouts his full lips), but you also just like seeing him passionate. You'd have to be a real moron to date someone like him and not value passion when you see it. 

"Atoms and cells, huh?" He looks over his shoulder at the open egg carton and leans over to get one. "Eggs. Eggs are like plant cells. The shell is the cell wall, the yolk is the nucleus, and the white is the cytoplasm." He breaks it open so you can poke it. 

"Do all cells have egg shells?"

"Uh, no. Just plant cells."

"So eggs are like mushrooms? Too deep."

"Actually, mushrooms are fungi so they're a... different type of...wall thing." Karkat mumbles out, as quiet as he really ever gets. 

"So mushrooms aren't plants, alright. Eggs aren't plants either so I guess the metaphor doesn't completely fall flat. Egg cells probably look nothing like eggs, right?" 

Karkat nervously starts chopping lettuce, completely forgetting this was supposed to be a learning experience. "So, um, you're really gonna hate this fact, but eggs are cells. Egg cells are just eggs." 

"....Cells are small."

"I mean, usually."

"....... Today has been a lot."

"Yeah. Science time is over." He looks relieved to be done with backpedaling and delivering unfortunate truths as he reaches into a shelf for a clean knife. "Care to tell history facts?"

"I mean, I would if it weren't totally useless. But now that Earth is gone it's..."

"Even more important. It's important to remember things that no one else knows or could learn. You're the only library we have when it comes to that." He flashes you a smile. "It's important."

You distract yourself with the mangled turkey, slapping it onto the bread. Unfortunately, there is only so much turkey you can put on a sandwich before you get to the next step, and your bf is blocking your path to the fridge. "Well, uh, human history. A lot happened. Any specifics?"

"Can you give me a highlight reel?"

"Are you fucking serious? A highlight reel of the entirety of my race?"

"Okay, okay. Just tell me a particular instance." He looks down at your hands. "Tell me the first history story you can think of that involves sandwiches."

You're opening the fridge now, staring blankly at its contents. You have no clue what goes where to make things tasty past PB&J. Luckily, turkey sandwiches aren't much more complex, so you pick up the mustard while racking your brain for sandwich stories. "Okay, so there was this one guy, who was angry and was part of this group called the Black Hand, and he was Serbian, and he wanted to kill this guy in Austria because, I think, border disputes? So then Austria declares war on Serbia because this dude just killed the archduke. But then Russia stepped in because Serbians are basically Russians and Russians are /also/ friends with Britain and France but Austria is friends with Germany so Germany attacks France but they have to go through Belgium to get there which really pisses off Britain. America got involved at some point."

"....."

".... The reason I thought of that was because the guy was eating a sandwich when he killed him."

"Thats nice but..... You know the only word I recognized was 'America', right?"

"Oh. Oh shit, sorry. Should I explain it more? Where should I start?"

"Well.... I feel like all those proper nouns are gonna take forever to explain.... So could you start with what's a 'border'?"

"Y'all really have no borders? They're what separates land that belongs to different people and where the laws are different and stuff. You don't have those?"

"All land is Her's."

All you can say is "Ah." You finished putting on mustard a while back and are awaiting further instruction. Karkat seems to understand that there is only so much learning one can do at once, and mercifully retrieves tomatoes from the fridge. He holds your hand while showing you how to cut. You know how to cut anything, but it feels too nice to be held to complain. 

__________****************___________

The next few weeks are like a dream, minus the tentacles and screeches of the horrorterrors. He teaches you something new everyday about the purposes of yeast and what goes in soup, but also does a perhaps just as important job by listening to you ramble about history. You've never had someone's rapt attention for so long before, and it was honestly unnerving at first. But the more time you spend with him, him having you lick dough off his fingers and smelling spices, the more it feels so deeply /whole/ to have someone listen to your interests with no purpose other than to make you feel important and to understand you better. You think you may very well love him. You also think, wistfully as you pour in vanilla extract, that you might tell him that. You might tell him that in big frosting letters.


End file.
